1/10 Jake's journal - more on that ship, Nat's back

Apparently I saw about as much of that ship blowing up as anyone.  They say it was over the hill from Compton, so no one in town had a view of the ship itself.  They interviewed seven of us separately, then put us in a room together, and had us try to fill in details.  Ted Havlock saw a power transmission, he said, then it went dark, and a few seconds later he saw the same flash I did, except it was light on top of a building nearby.  He didn't actually see the flash directly.  Then he heard the boom.  I didn't see anything before - I was looking the other way.  Then I saw the flash out of the side of my eye and looked that way.  The others didn't see anything directly at first, then they heard the explosion and saw the cloud.

The power receiver for Compton is east of the town.  The one for the glass house is northeast of the dome.  Ted wasn't sure that the ship was the same direction as the transmission, but it was a different direction from Compton's receiver.  He wasn't sure if the transmission he saw was the direction I was in, but it was more or less the same direction.  So we figure he actually saw the beam for the glass house, and it probably had nothing to do with the ship.  We did get power around that time, of course. Compton and the glass house get transmissions at pretty much the same time.

Just another odd thing, I think.  The UAE is pretty hot about the whole thing.  They say it was a fishing ship, which would have been marginally legal - they're not supposed to be fishing in our waters because of the treaty of such and such.  But the Yuans don't really care about what the rules are if they think something belongs to them.  And they think pretty much everything belongs to them.  I've never heard of a fishing ship blowing up like that one though.  Seems fishy to me (haha).

Nat and Artie got back from their hunting trip.  Sounds like they had a great time.  Nat tagged a roe deer.  Artie had spotted it, and she tracked it after the shot, but it only went about 80 meters.  Nat was all bragging about his mighty hunting, then Artie yipped something or another and really deflated mr. big head.  I gather it wasn't a terrific shot or something.  Anyway, they're inviting me over for a venison roast tomorrow.  Cool.

Looks like I did something right with those spray bots.  They're still running like a top.  They're about 2/3 through the first spraying, then we'll have to repeat weekly for a bit.  

Oh, another funny thing.  The composter repair guy came today, and swore they hadn't been by, and hadn't fixed anything.  He seemed a little mad I'd called him out for nothing.  But I swear the thing was breaking down again.  Last time there was a power problem with their auger (things were getting a little ripe from lack of mixing) and this seemed to be a similar problem.  He said it looks like it's working like new.  But when he checked the logs, he did find that there had been a problem.  It just seems to have clicked right back into place.  Not how that usually goes - usually there's some motor controller - like last time - that's burning out.  They don't tend to get better.  He took off again and said he'd ask around at his office.  More likely he took off for the bar, I think.

Jess had her first exams today.  Fingers crossed.